[TenTec] The Left-handed VI+

[Bob Close]

[Bob] I had an accident where my right hand was in a cast for six months
while tendons healed, and spent another six months learning how to pick up a
bottle of Budweiser again.  I found it only took a moment to learn cw left
hand style, and now, in fact, I find my timing is better with the left than
the right hand, probably due to the scars on the tendons sort of "snagging"
if my hand is in an awkward position. I think I could send code with my
ears.
     CW is a Godsend to some people. My father in the advanced stages of
Parkinson's could hardly speak, but he could rip off a conversation with his
one "good" hand, (his left, not his right hand, his preferred fist, was so
full of tremors that he sounded rather unusual, to say the least) (sort of
like a CW opp with a stutter)I would translate to Mom and she would just
talk to him. It was so much easier for him to tell us something he wanted to
say, as opposed to working hard to get a sound croaked out.  Mom never
learned the code, but she could pick up certain phrases (tell Mom 88, hw abt
ice cream? (Mom would be on the way to the freezer before I said a thing,
asking "what flavor").  
His Omni-VI+, the only rig he ever really wanted, had to be set to a
frequency and mode, antenna matched and aimed, so all he had to do was point
at the power switch for Mom, and off DX chasing he was.  His logs, so
precise and neat until the last two years, turned into batches of wrinkled
paper with almost unintelligible handwriting , one qso per page. But there
were contacts, many of them, and each one had the same "Thanks for your
patience and understanding" paragraph he sent when he thought his fist was
going bad.(posted on a card in front of him, so he would remember to ask for
the understanding)  No one ever complained about his fist, only his
repeating the entire qso because he forgot he had just had it.  So, to any
of you guys who worked K1SRR, thanks from his son, for your patience and
understanding, for his left-hand, no computer logging, not-so-bad cw.  The
rig still kicks butt! And, now I will never have any rig as my primary CW
radio other than a Ten-Tec of some sort.  Not because of nostalgia, but
because the dang things just work so well, without fuss or bother, no matter
what hand I tune it with.  I wish they made the VII in the old-school TT
colors.  Maybe a VII CLASSIC ! Put my order in.  73